Human beings have to face some problems in space life, the human body has to undergo a lot of changes, let me we take a look at some of what:
Limits of human adaptability
Human beings have the instinct to adapt to the environment, such as the Andes and the mountains of our country's Tibetan region are at an elevation of more than 3,000 meters above sea level, and the inhabitants of the place have been accustomed to breathing thin air with low oxygen content. According to the research, the local residents of each 1 cubic millimeter of blood contains only 50 to 1 million red blood cells (plains residents of 450 to 5 million), per 100 milliliters of blood contains hemoglobin 5 grams, which is the result of long-term adaptation to the low-oxygen environment. But the human adaptability is limited, more than the limit will die, such as from the flat earth suddenly and quickly into the 6000 meters of altitude, where there is only 0.5 atmospheric pressure, more than this limit will have a loss of consciousness, shock and other life-threatening, when reached 9000 meters height, stay at 1 minute 30 seconds, the consciousness will be completely lost. Therefore, jet fighter pilots must wear oxygen masks. But oxygen alone is not enough, there must also be a certain air pressure. Because oxygen can only be dissolved into the blood through the alveolar membrane, sent to the whole body, and through the alveolar membrane must have a certain air pressure to achieve, otherwise the body's blood and tissues are still lack of oxygen.
At altitudes above 7,500 meters, the air pressure is only 280mmHg (millimeters of mercury column), there will be a variety of decompression sickness, such as expansion of gas in the abdominal cavity, causing abdominal pain or even shock, confusion, followed by gas gasification and expansion of the tissues in the tissues, resulting in paralysis of the joints and nerves; when the altitude reaches more than 12,000 meters, even if the inhalation of 100% pure oxygen, the partial pressure of oxygen in the alveoli When the height of 12,000 meters or more, even if 100% pure oxygen is inhaled, the partial pressure of oxygen in the alveoli is lower than 60mmHg; to 19,000 meters, the air pressure is only 47mmHg, although the inhalation of pure oxygen, but because the alveoli are already full of saturated water vapor and carbon dioxide, so the oxygen can not be inhaled into the alveoli, the person is bound to die. When the air pressure drops below 47mmHg, at 37 ℃ saturated water vapor pressure and body temperature 37 ℃ saturated water vapor pressure in the body is equal, the body fluids will boil up. We know that 70% of the body's weight is water, and if all this water boils and vaporizes, the person will end up with a rupture.
The environment in space is much harsher than that. First of all, there is no air, people stay a few seconds will die, coupled with zero air pressure, people will become broken balloons as mentioned above; secondly, the temperature is high, the highest temperature during the day up to 130 ℃, the lowest temperature at night is only minus 146 ℃; In addition, the universe is full of lethal amount of ultraviolet light and cosmic rays, a moment can kill human genes and cells.
Space Sickness
People are in a state of weightlessness when flying in space. The first problem that occurs in weightlessness is space sickness, which affects one out of every two astronauts, and manifests itself in a pale face, cold sweat, and vomiting, like seasickness. Therefore, first of all, the astronauts to carry out the spinning ability to adapt to the check, this check is by no means as simple as generally imagined, because on the ground, even after rigorous training, is considered to be completely not spinning astronauts, when he is in space, "floating" up, will immediately occur when the motion sickness. Therefore, scholars believe that this space motion sickness and motion sickness and seasickness mechanism is different.
Currently, the mechanism of motion sickness is not completely clear, and is more based on the theory of sensory disorders. To summarize is that the human posture to rely on the brain synthesis is located in the inner ear of the vestibular organs and by the eyes, skin, muscles, joints to the letter to maintain, in which the vestibular organs of the balance of the sand is the most important, and in the state of weightlessness, the original ability to reach the balance of gravity sand anomaly, and thus the position of the information related to the brain can not be synthesized, and so cause disorders. And motion sickness and seasickness is related to the vestibular organ within the three different directions of the semicircular canal abnormalities.
Space sickness is not a serious disease, and the symptoms will disappear after five days when the body adapts, but it is not clear whether it will cause irreversible damage to the human body. That said, little information is yet available on the medical and physiological aspects of a long human stay in space.
Cardiovascular system also changes
Currently, scholars are more interested in the issue of low functioning of the heart and blood circulatory system in weightlessness. In weightlessness when the object has no weight, the body's blood and other body fluids will rush to the head and chest, compared with the ground when the increase of 2 liters, as a result of the astronauts of the head and neck is obviously swollen, the heart's output also increased, fatigue, and will soon be heart failure. However, it is also believed that due to the influx of blood to the upper part of the heart will be reduced in size by 10 percent, and will not recover until a year after reaching the ground.
In addition to this, the red blood cells in the astronaut's blood will decrease by 15 percent, with the peak of this decrease lasting about 40 days, then easing off and returning to normal in three months, so this change is also an adaptation to cosmic space. But there's another category that doesn't fall into the adaptive category, and one of the most dangerous is the loss of calcium in the body.
Calcium is constantly decreasing
Calcium is an essential element for human life. People into space after the first month lost 6 grams of calcium, equivalent to 0.5% of the body's total calcium, if this continues to lose without replenishment, then 8 to 9 months after any method of calcium supplementation will not help. If the calcium deficiency continues for 15 months, it can be life-threatening. In addition muscle degeneration is also a problem.
The cause of calcium deficiency is now thought to be hormone-related. The human body has a reaction to maintain balance under abnormal conditions, called "internal environmental stability", and in the case of weightlessness, as mentioned earlier, the distribution of body fluids is out of balance, and thus the "internal environmental stability" is disrupted, and the result will inevitably lead to the abnormal secretion of hormones, which is the cause of the problem. As a result, the "stability of the internal environment" is disrupted, which inevitably results in abnormal hormone secretion, as well as electrolyte disorders such as calcium and sodium, thus causing a chain reaction of abnormalities in all parts of the body. Japanese scholars have proposed a unique measurement method. With this method, changes in respiration, circulation, metabolism, body temperature and other aspects of the body can be accurately understood by analyzing changes in the composition of exhaled gas. The device is lightweight, about 20 kilograms, suitable for carrying in space.
Is it possible to create new humans?
The above is mainly about the adverse effects of cosmic space on the human body, the following talk about the benefits of the universe on the human body. According to research, in the universe , human nerve perception and ability are enhanced. Such as astronauts have been captured from space to the Caribbean Sea on the ship's route and photographed, but there are no traces of the ship on the negative, at that time thought it was a momentary hallucination, but later after the investigation, at the time of filming, the place does have a ship in motion. According to astronaut J. Owen, he returned from space after feeling clearer, sharper perception, and more energetic. Apollo 14 astronaut E. Mitchell in order to confirm the point, but also in the spacecraft and the Earth between the spirit of induction (telepathy) test.
The biggest problem encountered by human beings going in and out of space in the future is: what will happen to the human brain and mind when they are in space, or how the human brain can adapt to the space environment. Because if you set up an environment where space is narrow, and the space beyond is dark and connected to Earth only by a thin rope, you will inevitably feel lonely, alienated, and terrified in such an environment.
The space station is a miniature society of a few dozen people in a confined space, so the problems of human relationships on the ground are the same here, but more direct and closer, and there are few recreational areas to relieve the boredom, so human emotions are different from those on the ground. Another problem is the ability to cope with automated devices. In the cosmic space station, there may be automated devices everywhere, and human beings do not yet have the ability to have direct "conversations" with these automated devices, and those who are able to satisfactorily adapt to all kinds of automated devices in the cosmic space as well as to the narrow space with no gravity may no longer be space The human being may not be a spaceman in the general sense of the word. Therefore, scientists hypothesize that the second and third generations born to the first generation of space occupants will have physiological characteristics different from those of children on Earth. First of all, the function of walking upright may be degraded, due to the change of form, it is estimated that the consciousness will also have a large change with it, so that there may be a new human race.
Apollo 9 astronaut R. Sweickart once said, "The diversity of the environment is necessary to maintain the sound vitality of the species , especially harsh and unstable environments. Whereas the human environment on Earth is stable and uniform, then species in such an environment will degenerate and one day even become extinct for one reason or another." The fact that heat waves are killing people in the United States one after another is due to the fact that people's ability to regulate their body temperature by their own ability has declined.
It has therefore been predicted that after settling in the harsh environment of space, it will be possible for man to be tenacious in the form of a new species.
Since ancient times, people have been fantasizing about building jeweled pavilions in space and about living and residing in a fairyland outside the Earth. Myths and legends such as Chang'e running to the moon are also often found in ancient books.
So can humans living on Earth live in space? This question has become the ultimate goal pursued by space scientists since the manned space mission was first proposed. As we all know, human beings are in a state of weightlessness in space, a state that people cannot experience on Earth. It has a great impact on the human body's body position sensation and movement. People living on Earth can distinguish between up and down, left and right, and front and back due to the effect of gravity. But in space this concept does not exist. People in the air will not fall, to act is floating state. No gravity in space, there is no difference between up and down, astronauts in the cabin do not know whether they are standing or lying, they often forget where their hands and feet are, although the heart to understand, but they still feel that their hands and feet do not know where to go, and they often have the feeling of falling into a bottomless abyss.
Thus, to live in space, the most crucial thing is to solve the human beings to adapt to the weightless environment. Before the manned flight, scientists speculated that after the disappearance of gravity, the human cardiovascular, skeletal, muscular, digestive, endocrine, neurological and other systems will undergo serious disorders, which will affect the health of astronauts. For insurance purposes, mankind conducted a series of biological weightless flight experiments before manned flight. The former Soviet Union and the United States had sent puppies, monkeys, rats and chimpanzees into space, and found that weightlessness was not as terrible as some people expected, and it seemed that weightlessness would not cause too much damage to living things. So on April 12, 1961, the former Soviet astronaut Gagarin was sent into the sky, opening up the history of manned space flight.
But it takes some time to acclimatize to weightlessness. Scientists, through the study of each flight, have divided the changes in the physiological system of a person entering space into three stages of adaptation: the initial reaction period, the adaptation of the formation period, and the adaptation of the consolidation period. Through the three stages of adaptation, people must also carry out certain measures such as physical exercise to enhance the body's muscle energy, improve the physiological system of adaptation.
In space, in addition to weightlessness, there are other factors such as radiation, atmospheric pressure changes, a variety of harmful gases also have an impact on the human body. In addition, human beings have to face many problems such as starting a family and having children, as well as mental health problems if they want to live in space. Psychological changes such as homesickness, phobias, and tension in interpersonal relationships have arisen from previous human flights in space, and if they are in space for a long period of time, the psychological disorders of human beings will be even more pronounced. Therefore, whether human beings can ultimately realize the desire to live in space, but also to be scientists in the future flight of the research results.